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Some rights reserved.
Even Giants fans aren’t exactly sure sometimes who’s running around in Yomiuri uniforms for their favorite team, but they sure have to like the results.
The Giants held off the Nippon Ham Fighters 4-3 Saturday at Sapporo Dome to close out their fourth win of the week with some new faces in different places.
Michihiro “Guts” Ogasawara tops a long list of injured veterans, but fill-in Taishi Ota got the nod for his first start and had an infield single and a sac fly, while Alex Ramirez went 2-for-4 with two RBIs as the Giants split their series with Nippon Ham.
Recent addition Shinji Takahashi, whom the Giants picked up recently from the Fighters in a deal for cash, had his first hit for Yomiuri and Daisuke Fujimura played in his ninth game this season, going 1-for-4.
Ramirez leads the league with 23 RBIs. Tetsuya Utsumi (5-1) scattered a half-dozen hits with no walks and five Ks over six innings as the Giants snapped a seven-game losing streak at Sapporo Dome.
EAGLES 3, SWALLOWS 2
Seventh-year infielder Shoji Ohiro’s first hit in four years was a walk-off double to left that scored Teppei Tsuchiya -- barely -- from first in the bottom of the ninth, after Yakult had just tied the score, giving Rakuten the victory at The Kleenex Box.
Ohiro also made a diving play to save a run in the eighth inning, and now has three hits in his career. Rakuten slugger Takeshi Yamasaki hit his 40th longball in interleague play -- second most all-time.
HAWKS 7, TIGERS 0
Toshiya Sugiuchi fanned eight in a four-hitter to blank visiting Hanshin for his second straight shutout, giving SoftBank a franchise-record-tying third consecutive whitewashing.
The Hawks matched the team's 1971 mark, and Sugiuchi moved into the PL lead in ERA, lowering his to 1.31.
The Tigers suffered their third consecutive shutout loss -- the first time that has happened to them in 10 years -- and have a 32-inning scoreless drought.
LIONS 13, DRAGONS 4
Hiroyuki Nakajima slugged a grand slam and added a two-run blast for six RBIs, and Takeya Nakamura went deep twice and drove in three as Seibu put a beatdown on visiting Chunichi.
It was a season high in runs for the Lions, who also got a homer from Jose Fernandez to put an emphatic halt to Chunichi’s unbeaten string to start interleague.
CARP 3, BUFFALOES 2
Yoshiyuki Ishihara’s ninth-inning solo blast was the difference as Hiroshima snuck past Orix at Kyocera Dome.
Katsuhiro Nagakawa (1-0) worked a perfect eighth to pick up his first win since April 6, 2010. Hiroshima's Jun Hirose will be out at least a month with a thigh injury.
BAYSTARS 2, MARINES 2
Shuichi Murata hit a two-run shot, his second in as many days, to get Yokohama even, and the teams played 12 innings to end in a deadlock at The Q.
Murata increased his all-time homer lead in interleague play with his 41st against the PL.
[Edited by: jgibson on May 22, 2011 10:06 AM]